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In China, Blockbusters Like 'Star Wars' And 'Batman V Superman' Make Big Bucks Without Long Legs

Warner Bros.

Superhero fatigue struck again last night. Once again moviegoers have shown that they are clearly growing very tired of comic book superhero movies. How will the sub-genre survive Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice’s sad, pathetic $82.01 million opening day? The second of seven comic book superhero movies set to open in 2016, coming after Deadpool's pathetic ($346m+ and counting) performance last month, shows more signs that the comic book superhero boom is obviously nearing its end.

Said figure for the Zack Snyder superhero team up/beatdown sequel, by the by, is the fourth-biggest single day of all time. It’s way past the respective $67m Friday totals (off $15m-$18m in Thursday previews) of Furious 7 and The Hunger Games around this time in 2015 and 2012. It’s just ahead of The Avengers’s $80.8 million Friday and Jurassic World ($81.9m), and behind only Avengers: Age of Ultron ($84.4m), Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows part 2 ($91m), and Star Wars: The Force Awakens ($119.1m).

Not counting the Thursday previews, it earned $54.31 million on "pure Friday," putting it behind only Jurassic World ($63.m), Star Wars: The Force Awakens ($62.12m), The Avengers ($62.11m), and Avengers: Age of Ultron ($56.86m). What that means is that, at least for a day, it is noticeably less frontloaded than the above mega-blockbusters since it made a smaller percentage of its Friday total via Thursday previews. Oh, and it made $9m of that in IMAX and $8m of that in PLF auditoriums.

Dawn of Justice's $82.01 million opening day clobbered the $56m (counting Thursday shows) opening day of Man of Steel by 46%, which is almost identical to the jump between the Friday of Captain America: The First Avenger ($25.7m) and Captain America: The Winter Soldier ($36.9m). The film is acting like a break-out sequel to a much-liked original. That’s odd because Man of Steel was not exactly a beloved original. Sure, there are plenty out there who liked it more than me (and how I envied them that summer), but we’re not talking a Batman Begins/Pirates of the Caribbean situation here.

Warner Bros./Time Warner Inc. knew this back in July of 2013 when they announced that Man of Steel 2 would be converted into a Batman/Superman team-up movie. Said SDCC announcement, decided upon just days beforehand, came just a month after Man of Steel snagged a $128m opening but crashed-and-burned and ended up with just $291m domestic and $668m worldwide. That was no flop, but its reception wasn’t necessarily pointing towards a sequel that everyone was going to be breathlessly anticipating in 2-3 years’ time.

So the theoretical Man of Steel 2 became Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. Said movie ended up starring Ben Affleck as the Dark Knight, Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman (who turned out to be the mother of all added-value-elements in a world starved of female cinematic superheroes), Jessie Eisenberg as Lex Luthor, Jeremy Irons as Alfred, and so-forth. The film became Added Value Element: The Movie, where the fact that it was a sequel to Man of Steel was the least exciting thing about it.